ONLY Axis BBs 2 hit @ start…

For info we played twice with this rule and the result is 1/1 … mmm …  
Maybe it’s because we are not much experienced and we donno how to play the allies the best way as all newbies?

Anyway this “Rounded IPCs” option rule seems to balance the game and we’ll keep on testing it! If it comes around 50/50 on the long run = Perfect … But if it comes around 55/45 for the allies (with better allies moves by more experienced players) = Let’s say it’s a more historical tendency and I feel like it’s normal for the Axis player to be the underdog trying the challenge to change history!

And maybe the point is that as a frenchman I’m not too much fan of the Axis … Ha Ha!

We like to use an “Arms Buildup” instead of setting up the game the same way every time. People spend 7 rounds gradually building up the forces they want before the action starts. This adds a lot of variation to the games as you have different hot spots in different areas of the map depending on how the setup went.

Here’s how I would do it:

Don’t think of the new power as just “Italy.” Instead, think of the new power as “all minor Axis powers.” The starting territories would be Italy, Southern Europe, Algeria, Libya, Rumania/Bulgaria, Finland, French Indo-China Thailand, and Argentina (!). You can actually leave the starting unit setup as is – that will give the new player 2 fighters, a battleship, and a transport to start with, while still leaving Germany and Japan with a bomber and five fighters each.

Open the Turkish Straits.

Put Italy first in the turn order, e.g., Italy - Russia - Germany - UK - Japan - USA. This is OK because Italy’s not really in position to mess up the Russian starting units too badly.

Leave Italy at 3 IPCs, and create a new 2 IPC territory out of neutral “Peru Argentina” that starts out empty, under Italian control, just as Brazil starts out empty and under American control. This will give Italy 14 IPCs at the start of the game – enough to buy a carrier, or a fighter, or a bomber, or a cruiser.

It’s OK that Italy has only three production slots, because Italy’s going to want to drop some expensive air/sea units. For example, if on turn one Italy builds 3 infantry and saves 5 IPCs, then on the next turn Italy might have as much as 22 IPCs to spend – which is really easy to do; you could buy a fighter and a bomber, or a transport, a destroyer, and a tank. Having only three production slots doesn’t really cripple the Italian player, and it wouldn’t be realistic anyway for Italy to crank out enormous armies of infantry; Italy’s population just wasn’t that large. If you really want to, you can probably build an Italian factory on turn 2 in Rumania.

That’s an interesting idea.  Indeed, the actual history justifies fighting for specific islands and this would help to reinforce that as well as promote action in the Pacific.  Something to ponder….

I agree with the initial premise of this post. Russia could definitely use a boost in 1942.2

@Der:

Or you could give Russia production bonuses after holding out a while, to represent the increased production over time. Like after round three Russia gets 3 bonus IPCs per round, after round six they get 6 IPCs per round, etc.

This is one of the more interesting ideas I’ve heard in a while. I like it for its simplicity. You could play this way with a direct correspondence between Round and IPCs awarded.

Round 1 = 1 ipc
Round 2 = 2 ipcs
Round 3 = 3 ipcs
Round 4 = 4 ipcs
Round 10 = 10 ipcs
and so on

this would mean that the effect on the early game would be fairly minimal, but each round that the game progresses, the Russian advantage would become more potent. The higher boosts would also kick in at precisely the time when the Russians need more loot, since all their land has been snatched. This would give the Axis a strong incentive to attack early, rather than trying to wait it out. So for example, as Germany, if you had choice between a somewhat risky attack on Moscow, or waiting 3 more rounds for Japan to back it up, you might just go for the attack rather than facing the extra lend lease loot that Russia receives. Each round you push the game out the larger the benefit becomes, which would encourage faster game resolution, at least on the part of Axis. Not sure might work.

I support basically anything that gives the Russians a boost on this board.

My favored change (in terms of a hard and fast set up adjustment) is to just give the Russians a bomber. Which seems to work fairly well at balancing this board in my playgroup :-D

I’d prefer Germany-Ottomans, Italy-Austria & France-Russia.

Turtledove’s World War could be a very good mod for G40, but it has the problem that one of the main alien landing groups starts at Poland (and holds the whole war as alien). That would totally mess any type of A&A mechanics, unless that you go ‘ahistorical’, give a token force for the Race at Poland and the focus at alien strongholds at southern hemisphere.

The alien invasion of US would be challenging for a modder, because you would have to mod USA’s territories. A mod best suit for AABattlemap or TripleA, but not for real board

Any case, it would need a VPs system to allow individual victories. And plenty of nukes. Also, different units and costs for Race and humans, with Race being uber-units but costly, and humans being crappy units but horribly cheap

For alien invasions in WWII, not only Turtledove, but also Hearts of Iron series and mods include some alien cheats or scenarios

If anybody is interested in the actual dispositions of the fleets ( though it is for 1941 and not 1940)

http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/oob/us_1.htm

http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/oob/jap_2.htm
http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/oob/jap_3.htm
http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/oob/jap_1.htm